


Alms To Our Worldly Selves

by pandoradeloeste



Category: The AM Archives (Podcast), The Bright Sessions (Podcast), The College Tapes (Podcast)
Genre: Anxiety, Bondage, M/M, Porn with Feelings, Tier 5 is its own warning, two idiots who are bad at communication
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-04
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-10 04:40:44
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,427
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27868541
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pandoradeloeste/pseuds/pandoradeloeste
Summary: Every relationship Oliver had been in had at least one person who came up with brilliant ideas, but couldn’t be bothered with the details needed to turn their brilliant ideas into reality. True to form, Mark had put a lot of thought intowhyhe needed to spend the evening tied up, and had leftliterally everything elseto Oliver.Plus: biphobic shades of pink, slant rhymes, a helpful wikiHow article, pineapple on pizza, and pure serotonin.
Relationships: Mark Bryant/Oliver Ritz
Kudos: 16





	Alms To Our Worldly Selves

**Author's Note:**

> Title is from "Befitting Kindness" by @ohthestoryteller
> 
> Thanks to @exhaustedwerewolf for beta-ing this PWP that got WAY THE FUCK away from me. 
> 
> Content notes for bondage, discussions of trauma, a glancing reference to terminal illness, and anxiety. 
> 
> Obligatory Mom Friend warning: Kink is not a substitute for therapy, don't try this at home kids.

“You’re sure about this?”

“I’d better be, I’m the one who came up with the idea.” Mark was carefully breezy and casual, watching the rope run through Oliver’s hands.

“ _Mark._ ”

Mark blinked and met Oliver’s eyes, and took a deep breath. “Mostly? I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t nervous, the last two panic attacks weren’t exactly a barrel of laughs, but. . .yeah. Yeah, I’m sure. Are _you_ sure?”

Oliver shrugged and forced a laugh. “Me? Pssh, yeah, I’ve got the easy job. All I have to do is tie a knot. I could tie it in my sleep at this point.” He really should have marked the midpoint somehow. Doing this every time was going to be tedious.

“Remember that when I make you wait on me hand and foot.”

“Who said anything about waiting on you? _You’re_ the one who wanted to be tied up so badly.” Oliver finally ran out of rope. “Sit down. Give me your hands.”

Mark took a measured breath and watched Oliver’s hands as he worked. Oliver hadn’t been exaggerating much. He’d practiced on chair legs, water bottles, and anything else he could wrap rope around for the last few weeks, and the movements were automatic by now. But tying another person - tying _Mark_ \- felt different. He found himself moving more slowly, lining up the ropes with care and precision he normally didn’t bother with.

A sharp intake of breath pulled his attention away from the knots. Mark was staring up at the ceiling, lips pressed together and blinking rapidly. “Hey,” he said softly, cupping Mark’s cheek. “Are we good?”

Mark swallowed and nodded. His face was a queasy mix of fear, arousal, and determination, and Oliver had another moment of giddy disbelief that they were actually doing this.

When Oliver had started the conversation about things they liked in bed and Mark had mentioned that he liked bondage, Oliver had sprung for a nice pair of leather cuffs, ethically sourced from a local leatherworker to spare Mark’s delicate anti-capitalist sensibilities. They’d barely touched Mark’s skin before they both realized how similar the cuffs looked and felt to the restraints the AM used. The cuffs had been thrown into a corner of the room, and Oliver had spent the next half hour holding Mark and fighting down the panicky jitters racing down his legs. Fuzzy purple handcuffs from Spencer’s were as far from the AM restraints as possible, but they’d still made Mark’s breath go fast and shuddering, and not in the fun way. 

In a fit of desperation Oliver had used a necktie to tie Mark’s hands together one night, and it was. . .well, at least it hadn’t given Mark a panic attack, but it made the sex grim and hard, something to be endured rather than enjoyed. To add insult to injury, it turned out that silk stretched more than either of them had counted on, and they’d had to destroy one of Oliver’s favorite ties to cut Mark free. Oliver had been ready to give up and find a less traumatic kink, until Mark had suggested an alternative.

The last knot was done, and Oliver leaned in to kiss Mark on the forehead. Mark melted into him a little, and Oliver held him until the tension in his shoulders eased and his breathing evened out. “Not too bad,” Mark finally said, half to himself, and Oliver felt him rotate his wrists and pull against the rope a little.

“Glad you approve,” he said, mock-stern. 

Mark huffed a laugh and nudged him with his shoulder. “So. . .dinner?”

~ ~ ~

Every relationship Oliver had seen or been in had at least one person who came up with brilliant ideas for trips and date nights and solutions to problems, but couldn’t be bothered with the details needed to turn their brilliant ideas into reality. True to form, Mark had put a lot of thought into _why_ he needed to spend the evening tied up without Oliver touching him sexually: they’d both spent too long being handcuffed to chairs and lab tables in Tier 5, and they needed to get used to the idea of restraints again, in a relaxed environment with no scalpels or wires, before going any further. He’d even been the one to suggest rope instead of handcuffs.

Unfortunately, that was where Mark’s enthusiasm for planning had ended. Oliver had had to work out the details, including the kind of rope (“just don’t use that stringy plastic shit from the hardware store”), how to actually tie Mark up safely, what to do for the night once he was tied up (“no ballroom dancing or Twister”), or even what to have for dinner. After Mark had followed Oliver into the kitchen and vetoed everything Oliver knew how to make, he’d almost ordered in Ethiopian or pho just to spite him, but relented and got burritos instead.

Eating half a breakfast burrito calmed Mark enough to get him talking about the band he’d photographed last night, and he settled in with Oliver under one of Chloe’s afghans to watch Breaking Bad. Normally Oliver refused to watch it with Mark since it set his teeth on edge, but he wasn’t the one tied up tonight, he could afford to be generous.

Mark got through half an episode before grabbing the remote between his hands and pausing it. “Stop babying me,” he snapped. “I know you hate this show. You’re doing that thing with your mouth whenever you see someone doing science incorrectly.”

“It’s just - that’s not how you make meth!”

“I don’t want to know how you know that. Just pick something that doesn’t make you grind your teeth?”

Oliver glanced down at Mark’s hands, twisting in their ropes again. “Are you sure?”

“I’m tied up, not dying of cancer. I’ll survive an episode or two of nerd TV.” Mark began picking at the knot with his teeth.

“What are you doing?”

“Ha’ oo go’oo uh -” Mark spat out the rope and smacked his lips. “Had to go to the bathroom.”

“Here, I’ve got it.” Oliver began picking at the damp knots. “Why didn’t you say something?”

Mark shrugged carefully. “I thought I could get it on my own.”

“I mean, you _could,_ that’s why I put the knot where you can reach it, but it’s easier if I just - here.” The knots came undone and Oliver pulled the rope off Mark’s wrists. While he was out of the room, Oliver idly began transmuting the purple dye from a corner of the afghan onto the midpoint of the rope.

“Don’t let Chloe see you messing with her blanket,” Mark said as he came back.

“I’m doing us all a favor. Chloe needs to learn to pick color palettes that don’t make me go blind,” Oliver shot back, but he put some of the dye back into the afghan before starting to coil the rope back up.

“It’s a bi pride afghan. It’s not supposed to be particularly subtle.” 

“Well, this shade of pink is biphobic.”

“Rude.” Mark sat down and held out his hands toward Oliver expectantly. “Well?”

Oliver blinked. “You _want_ to be tied up again tonight?”

“It’s. . .actually not terrible. Clumsy, but I’m getting used to it.”

Mark’s gaze felt like a weight against Oliver this time. Whenever he glanced up, Mark was watching his face instead of his hands, less like he was going to vibrate off the couch and more like he was really taking in Oliver tying him up this time. It made something twist pleasantly in his stomach. “What does it feel like?” he asked, sliding a few fingers between the ropes and Mark’s wrists to make sure they weren’t too tight.

“I don’t know, like rope?” Oliver gave him a dirty look. “Okay, fine, I know what you mean.” He chewed the inside of his cheek and looked at the twilit city outside the window. “I wish I could say it’s completely comfortable and doesn’t make my skin crawl even a little bit. I _remember_ it being comfortable, before the. . .well, before.” He sighed. “I remember it being _fun_.”

Oliver suppressed a shudder. “Yeah, not to kinkshame, but this doesn’t look like a good time.”

“Hm, I guess it wouldn’t for you. Especially not now, after. . .”

“The all-expenses-paid stay at Club AM?”

“Yeah. That.” Mark looked down at their hands. “Right now, it’s not all that fun for me either. I don’t hate it,” he added hurriedly as Oliver opened his mouth to protest that they could stop any time. “Trust me, we’ve both seen what it looks like when I hate it. This is. . .when you got to the AM, were they still doing those tests where they handcuffed you to a chair and cranked up the heat and left you alone for hours before making you -”

“Yes. I remember. Thank you,” Oliver said, too loudly.

Mark pulled against the rope a little. “Right now, this feels. . .safe, because it’s you, and I know you’ll take care of me, and you’ll let me out of these when I say I want out. But it also feels a little like being cuffed to a chair and left alone in a sauna.”

“ _Jesus._ ” Oliver didn’t bother suppressing the shudder this time. “And that’s something you _want_ to feel?”

“‘Want’ is a strong word. I think I _have_ to, at least a little bit, if I ever want it to be comfortable again. Let alone fun.” Mark shook himself abruptly. “All right, enough. Pick something we can watch without you nitpicking their meth-making technique.”

Mark grumbled through an episode of Queen’s Gambit, but his head was a warm, comfortable weight on Oliver’s lap, and for once Oliver didn’t mind having to read the subtitles more than usual. It would have been a perfect evening except for the occasional creak of rope that sounded like oppressive heat and thirst and needles. 

~ ~ ~

“I’m just saying, I don’t think it’s as impressive as people make it out to be.”

“Wha - how can you - he spent a _year_ writing that song! A _year!_ ” Mark lowered his hands with a frustrated growl. After several evenings with his hands tied together, he still hadn’t figured out how to stop trying to talk with his hands. Oliver _might_ have baited him into heated discussions a few times to watch him try.

“And he should have taken longer if it meant he didn’t have to use so many slant rhymes.”

“There’s nothing wrong with slant rhymes! It’s a hip-hop musical, hip-hop’s full of slant rhymes.”

“In an actual rap battle where the lyrics are improvised, fine, whatever, but in a prewritten musical it’s just _sloppy._ ” Oliver pulled out his phone and googled the lyrics. “Look, he tried to rhyme ‘college’ with ‘astonish’? And then ‘disadvantage’, ‘brandish’, and ‘famished’? In what universe do those rhyme?”

“They rhyme _enough_. And it doesn’t matter that they’re not perfect. The song slaps anyway.”

“Fine, but it works despite the slant rhymes. And really, ‘slaps’? You sound like Caleb. Stop trying to talk like the youth, you’re over 30, it’s beneath you.”

“Pretentious asshole.”

“Yeah, but you love it.” Oliver leaned in to steal a kiss. Mark yelped a little into Oliver’s mouth before twisting his fingers into Oliver’s shirt to hold him steady. Oliver swallowed a surprised noise of his own - it wasn’t the first time they’d kissed while Mark was tied up, but they were usually quick pecks for comfort or affection, nothing that lingered or picked up heat. He was still trying to decide what it meant when his work cell rang, and groaned as he pulled himself away. “Hold that thought, back in a second.”

His coworker’s son had gotten sick, and she needed Oliver to cover her class tomorrow so that she could take him to the doctor. Oliver had to go over her lesson plan, then call back to ask a question about the lab, and just when he thought he was done for the night, he remembered two graduate students had asked to meet tomorrow, and he had to email them to reschedule.

When he looked up from his laptop, he heard muffled cursing from the living room. “Mark?” Oliver called. No answer. Too late, he remembered a warning not to tie someone up and leave them alone, and handcuffs in a sweltering room on Tier 5. “Oh _hell,_ ” he whispered, slamming the computer closed.

Mark was holding his hands to his mouth, tearing at the knots with his teeth. He jumped up when he saw Oliver, and yanked his hands apart roughly. The knots came apart and the rope slithered onto the couch.

“I’m sorry,” he panted, sounding as if he’d run a mile. “You were gone, and I didn’t know when you were coming back, and I. . .” He clenched and unclenched his hands. “I’m sorry.”

“I was thirty feet away in the next room,” Oliver said slowly, feeling like his face was frozen. “Why didn’t you just. . .I would have. . .”

Mark was rubbing the back of his neck miserably. There were red rings around his wrists where he’d been pulling against the ropes. Oliver wasn’t sure if that had happened while they’d been kissing, or while he’d been calling Sandra back about her lesson plan.

It was suddenly stifling in the apartment. “Are you all right?”

“Yeah, I -”

“Okay good I need some air back in a minute,” and he was out the door with barely enough time to grab his keys and a jacket.

The days were getting longer, but it was full dark, and in early March the nights were still raw and just below freezing. The bite of cold air on his cheeks felt. . .not good, exactly, but clear and sharp enough that he could breathe again.

It wasn’t the first time Mark had ended his. . .project? experiment?. . .early for the night. Last week an episode of Leverage had had some scenes in an underground psych lab, and even after they’d turned off the TV he’d barely been able to sit still long enough for Oliver to untie him. But it was the first time he’d needed to be untied because of something Oliver had done. 

_This feels safe, because it’s you, and I know you’ll take care of me._

He swallowed bile and counted telephone poles until he could stop seeing Mark’s face, pale and shaking, miles away from the Mark who had been humming songs from Hamilton and grinning into a kiss. It took a _lot_ of telephone poles, and by the time he got back, Mark was in bed under what had to be every blanket in the apartment. He was too tense and tightly curled up to be asleep, but Oliver let him pretend, even though it made his stomach churn as he lay down facing the wall. If he was Mark, _he_ wouldn’t want to talk to Oliver right now either.

Mark was still asleep - really asleep this time - when Oliver left for class. His substitute lab ran late, and when he got back to the apartment, Mark had already gone to work. He was out until two or three on work nights, and Oliver wasn’t sure whether to be relieved. He ate dry cereal out of the box for dinner, graded problem sets, tossed the rope into a corner of the broom closet to deal with later, deleted all of his bookmarks on bondage and cleared his browser history, and wished he hadn’t promised not to keep any alcohol in the apartment. 

~ ~ ~

Oliver had grown up with sisters who let him know right away when he’d done something wrong, loudly and at length. He knew how to hold his own in a shouting match. Being on the receiving end of Mark’s pointed silence was new and nerve-wracking. If it was Grace or Emma he could have needled them a little until they snapped and broke the tension with a nice, cathartic fight, but he knew from experience that when Mark was really angry, he had a stupidly high tolerance for needling. Mark would snap when he was good and ready, and not a minute sooner.

The tense quiet lasted until Sunday morning, when Caleb came to pick up Mark for Quidditch. He flinched when Oliver opened the door, which stung a little - he probably looked a little rumpled from three nights of shitty sleep, but he wasn’t a _complete_ wreck. “And good morning to you, too, Carlos,” he sniped as he stepped aside to let him in.

“Caleb,” he said with a long-suffering sigh. “Long week?”

“Something like that. Byron, your mini me is here,” he called over his shoulder.

“Mini me? I’m taller than _both_ of you,” Caleb muttered as he filled his water bottle from the kitchen sink.

“Where’d you put the broom?” Mark shouted from the bedroom.

“In the closet where it belongs.” He stepped out of the way as Mark came out to rummage through the closet. A clatter and a curse came from the kitchen. “You all right?” he called.

“Uh, yeah, just dropped my water bottle. Mark, you ready to go?”

Oliver graded problem sets and planned the next organic chem lab and zoned out to Planet Earth (more of the latter, if he was honest with himself) until he heard Mark’s key in the lock. “. . .should listen to the audio book if you can,” Mark was saying. “It’s got a bunch of different voice actors doing the narration, and it really feels like a documentary. . .hold on, I’ll get it.”

He went into the bedroom, and Oliver heard him rummage through his bookshelf. “Mark’s finding me his copy of World War Z,” Caleb explained.

“That’s going to take a while. You might want to sit down,” Oliver said, not looking up from his lesson plans.

“Nah, I’m sweaty from Quidditch.”

“Suit yourself. It takes forever to find anything in there. He won’t alphabetize his books like a civilized person.”

Caleb shifted his weight awkwardly, then sat gingerly on the edge of the couch. “Okay, what the fuck is going on with you two?” he whispered.

“Ex _cuse_ me?” Oliver summoned up his best “don’t fuck with me if you value your GPA” look over his reading glasses. It was wasted on Caleb, who was looking back at the bedroom.

“You’re both this. . .sludgy gray-green.”

“I don’t speak empath, kid.”

“Guilty. Both of you are sad and guilty. Did you have a fight or something? It feels like a fight.”

“I’m not gossiping about my problems with you.” Oliver clicked through the tabs on his browser thoughtfully. “Sad and guilty, you said? Not angry?”

“Believe me, I know what angry Mark feels like, and this isn’t it. He’s a little frustrated, but he's not angry.” 

“Huh.”

Caleb fidgeted with the faded corner of the afghan. “Look, I know it’s none of my business -”

“You’re right, Carter. It isn’t.”

Caleb didn’t bother correcting Oliver, and they sat in awkward silence until Mark emerged from the bedroom with Caleb’s book.

Oliver barely noticed when Caleb left and Mark took a shower. Mark wasn’t angry, and Oliver could breathe properly for the first time in days. He gave himself a few minutes to bask in the giddy relief before remembering the first thing Caleb had said: Mark felt sad and guilty. Which was _insane_ when Oliver had been the one who’d fucked up.

He clicked through all of his tabs again, and a third time. Then he closed the laptop, took off his glasses and his watch, searched the closet for a few minutes, took a deep breath, and went into the bedroom.

“I want you to tie me up,” he said, tossing the rope onto the bed next to Mark.

Mark looked back and forth between the rope and Oliver for a few long seconds. “If this is a joke, it’s a really bad one.”

“It’s not a joke.” He hadn’t felt this naked since the first time they’d slept together. “I don’t know if that’s something you still want to do with me, or if you’re even into it anymore, or if I ruined it for you forever, but if you are. . .” He sat down next to Mark and held out his hands, which were only shaking a little. “Come on. I’ll talk you through it.”

“I don’t - Oliver, nothing’s _ruined,_ I’m just. . .” Mark gently took Oliver’s hands and let out a slow breath. “Are you sure _you_ want to? Tie me up, I mean?”

“I - yeah? Why wouldn’t I?”

“Wait, so what was all that sulking about?”

“Sulking? What sulking? I was trying to give you space! I thought you were mad at me!”

Mark blinked at Oliver, then began giggling.

“It’s not funny!” Oliver tried to say indignantly, and ruined it by cracking a smile. They held each other and laughed, and it was the best Oliver had felt in weeks.

“ _Ohhh_ my _god,_ we are the fucking _worst,_ ” Mark gasped as they wound down.

“We really are.” Oliver wiped his eyes and cleared his throat. “Okay, but seriously, I really _am_ sorry I left you alone.”

Mark shrugged. “S'fine. I just wish you hadn’t run away before we talked about it. I’m sorry I panicked. I should have come and talked to you before it got that bad.”

“No, you told me it reminded you of the AM, and I was an idiot and I forgot. That’s kind of why I need you to tie me up. I don’t know much about. . . _any_ of this.” He jerked his chin toward the coil of rope next to them. “I know it’s important to _you,_ though. Important enough that you’d risk letting me remind you of. . .everything. And the only way I’m going to stop making stupid mistakes is to see what it’s like for you. So get a move on.”

A dozen different emotions flickered across Mark’s face, and he leaned in and kissed Oliver softly and thoroughly. “Okay,” he said. “Remind me how to do this again?”

Between a helpful wikiHow article and Oliver’s instructions - “fussing”, Mark called it - they managed to tie Oliver’s hands. “How’s that?” Mark said, pulling on the knot experimentally.

“Fine,” Oliver lied. Mark pulling on the rope had tugged him absurdly off-balance, considering they were both still sitting. “Hey, do you remember a guard named Driscoll?”

“Driscoll, Driscoll. . .was that the one with the greasy blond hair and the broken nose?”

“That’s the one. Liked to get rough and drag us around when we were in the restraints. Especially the women. God, I hadn’t thought about that fucker in _years._ ”

“Knowing Joanie, she probably fired him during her first week at the AM.” Mark frowned and looked closely at Oliver. “Did you eat anything today?”

“Um. Maybe?” He remembered drinking coffee hours ago, but he wasn’t sure if he’d eaten.

“ _O_ -kay, yup, that’s what I thought.” Mark picked up his phone and got up. “We’re ordering pizza now.”

Oliver followed him into the kitchen, where Mark was rummaging through the drawer of old takeout menus and flyers, and scraped a splatter of something dark red (ketchup? raspberry jam?) off the doorframe. “I still don’t understand why you won’t use Postmates like a normal person.”

“I'm not giving my money to an app that charges restaurants and steals tips. Where’s the menu for Derrick’s?”

“It’s on the fridge. Don’t get pineapple this time.”

“Just pick it off and give it to me,” Mark said as he dialed.

“I’ll still taste it.” Oliver caught himself scratching compulsively at the back of his hand. He gave up trying to convince Mark to order something edible and pushed past him to straighten up the kitchen, or at least try to. It turned out that putting dishes away with his hands tied together was dangerously clumsy. How did Mark make it look so easy?

“Whoa, slow down,” Mark said behind him.

“I’ve got it.” 

“You’re going to hurt yourself. Or break something.”

“I said I’m _fine._ ” He dropped a mug in the sink and it shattered. “Oh _fuck me_ -”

“Whoa, okay, that’s enough.” Mark caught his hands and pulled him into a hug. Oliver grabbed at Mark’s shirt and breathed in his scent until he stopped shaking.

“How the fuck did you do this for _hours?_ ” he asked quietly into Mark’s shoulder.

Mark kissed his forehead. “Lots of deep breathing, at first. Reminding myself that I was here, above ground, with you, and that you’d untie me if I asked. Food helped.” Right on cue, the kettle whistled, and Mark fumbled behind them to turn off the stove. “Do you want me to untie you?”

Oliver shook his head and stepped back. “I’m not giving up after five minutes.”’

“Oliver, you don’t have anything to prove. If you’re not enjoying it -”

“I said I was going to see what it feels like, and I meant it.”

“Ah. I see. For _science._ ”

“An hour. I can last an hour.”

Mark sighed and shook his head. “Fine, but if you panic again, I’m untying you, science be damned.” He started opening cupboards. “Protein, what do we have that has protein. . .”

Oliver let Mark set him up on the couch with a mug of tea and peanut butter toast. The food _did_ help, a little. So did Chloe’s afghan wrapped around his shoulders, and listening to Mark hum in the kitchen as he cleaned up the broken mug, deliberately loud so that Oliver could hear him. “Bring me the broken pieces,” he called. “Let me fix it.”

“I _can_ do it, you know.”

“I need to do something other than watch the clock. Besides, you always leave the cracks showing.”

“Jerk,” Mark muttered affectionately, but he laid the pieces out on the coffee table next to Oliver and dropped a kiss on his temple before sitting down. 

It took several passes for Oliver to transmute the mug back together to his satisfaction. He kept getting distracted by Mark - the set of his jaw as he doodled the snakes and bats they saw on Planet Earth, the rhythm of his conversation with the delivery driver, his hands as he passed Oliver a plate of pizza (no pineapple, bless him). It made him itchy and restless if he thought about it too much. 

“You’ve really never been tied up before?” Mark asked once the hour was up and Oliver was celebrating his freedom cuddled into Mark on the couch.

“Before the AM? Nope. Never had any partners who were into it.” Oliver looked up at Mark. “What about you? When did you get a taste for it?”

“Girlfriend in college.” Mark ran his fingers through Oliver’s hair. “I never _needed_ to be tied up to get off or anything - I mean, obviously - but once in a while it’s fun. Or at least it used to be.”

Oliver closed his eyes and leaned into Mark’s hand. “What made it fun?”

Mark was quiet for so long that Oliver started to wonder if he hadn’t heard the question, before saying softly, “I liked giving up control for a little bit. Having something tangible to be a boundary I could push against. Something that forced me to stay still and pay attention to what was happening.” 

Oliver opened his eyes and thought about the way he’d been absurdly riveted by Mark for the last hour. He could see how other people might find it titillating, in a different context and with fewer memories of extralegal imprisonment. “That. . .must have been nice.”

“Yeah. It was.” Mark scratched his nails over Oliver’s scalp. “But now it’s all mixed up with Wadsworth, and fucking _Driscoll,_ and all the other sadistic assholes working at the AM. And I thought I could just. . .I don’t know, do the right breathing exercises, or spend enough time being safe and chill with you. It seemed like it _was_ helping. But the minute something goes wrong, I panic.” He rubbed his neck and stared out the window. “I don’t know. Maybe it was stupid to think this could work again.”

Oliver felt a flash of rage at the AM for taking everything that had brought Mark joy before his abduction and ruining it. He scooted upright to kneel on the couch facing Mark and kissed him. He tasted like pizza sauce and pineapple. “It will. I promise.”

Mark sighed and rested his forehead against Oliver’s. “You can’t promise that, Oliver. No one can.”

“No, fuck that.” He pulled back enough to look at Mark without going cross-eyed. “Listen, being tied up was never fun for me before, and there’s no hope of it ever being fun now. The AM made sure of that. But you. . .they don’t get to take _this_ from you, too. Not if I have anything to say about it.”

Mark’s eyes flicked down to his lips, and his hands found Oliver’s waist. “Just don’t run away again?”

“Never.” Oliver kissed him again, and Mark groaned into his mouth. To hell with bondage, he _knew_ they were good at this.

~ ~ ~

“We should do our own seder this year.”

Mark blinked. “Um. What?”

“A seder? The thing where we invite our friends over for dinner, and we argue about whether the plague of frogs was lots of regular-sized frogs or one big kaiju frog, and then we get drunk and sing about pet goats?”

“Yes, _thank you,_ but - are you sure? You hated the idea last year.”

“Yeah, well, things were different last year.” Strictly speaking he didn’t need to look at his hands anymore - at this point he could probably tie Mark up blindfolded - but it was easier than looking at Mark. Last year he’d invented an out-of-town conference to avoid going to Sam’s seder. They’d just started talking about moving in together, and the idea of spending a whole night with a room full of AM employees and 20-something atypicals who all felt entitled to ask probing questions about him and Mark (or worse, make assumptions) had made his skin crawl. 

“What changed?” Mark asked quietly.

Oliver shrugged. “Well, the living room isn’t full of my stuff in boxes. And the kitchen isn’t a biohazard anymore.” That, and the memory of spending last Pesach alone in a motel room outside Albany still made his chest ache. At least at the AM he’d had a shadowy government agency to blame when he was lonely; having only himself to blame was worse. “Baby steps,” he added softly as he tucked in the ends of the rope.

When he looked up, Mark was looking down at their hands with a small smile. “Yeah, sure, a seder sounds nice.” He frowned and fumbled at his phone. “Wait, when is Pesach this year?”

Oliver checked his phone. “Oh. Fuck. It’s in two weeks.”

Mark had barely managed to unlock his phone when it buzzed. “Aaand the Hayes just sent out their invite for the first night.”

“We could take the second night?” Oliver suggested weakly.

“Chloe’s doing the second night.” Mark tossed his phone back onto the nightstand. “Well, it was a good idea while it lasted.” He elbowed Oliver. “Next year, get your shit together _before_ April?”

“My shit’s together!” Oliver said indignantly.

“Suuure, that’s why we had unpacked boxes in the living room until _New Year’s._ ”

“Because you wouldn’t move your stuff to make room for another bookshelf.”

“I was trying to _sell_ that equipment. And if you’d just gotten an e-reader, we wouldn’t have so many books.”

“You know Amazon retains access to every file you download from them? They can just _erase_ your entire library on a whim, even if you already paid for it all. Fuck that. They can pry paper books out of my cold, dead hands.”

“ _Wow,_ you’re a crotchety old man.”

Oliver hooked a finger in the ropes around Mark’s wrists and pulled him in abruptly. “Have some respect for your elders, young grasshopper.”

Mark inhaled sharply, and Oliver froze. God _fucking_ damn it, he’d done it again, he’d let Mark’s easy jokes and good mood lull him into doing something stupid. . .except Mark wasn’t panicking or pulling away. He was holding himself very still, biting his lip and staring back at Oliver without a trace of fear. The air between them felt charged, _hungry_ in a way it had never been before while Mark was tied up.

Oliver felt a sudden swoop of vertigo, and he dropped Mark’s hands and rocked back. Mark swayed forward slightly before catching himself and sitting up straight. “Are we good?” he asked, sounding slightly out of breath.

“Yeah, no, that’s, um, that’s good, right? That’s what we wanted, so. . .yeah, it’s fine, I’m fine, I’m just going to get some water.”

He did _not_ run away, because he’d promised he wouldn’t do that again, but he took his time running a glass of water in the kitchen. “What the _fuck,_ ” he whispered. 

He was supposed to have the easy job. Tie a knot, keep Mark safe, and wait for him to. . .do whatever he needed to not panic in restraints. Simple enough on paper. Except over the past few weeks, Oliver had seen how fragile that safety was, how little it took for the spice of imagined danger to tip into memories of very real abuse and fear. And that was _without_ the sex.

Mark knew that Oliver would never hurt him on purpose. Oliver knew that Mark knew it. That didn’t make it any easier to look at Mark and not see all the ways he could send them both spiraling back into memories they’d been doing their best to move on from, in their own ways. 

Mark coughed from the doorway, and Oliver barely managed to avoid dropping the glass. “Is this a private panic attack, or can anyone join?”

“I’m not _panicking,_ Byron.”

“If you say so.” Mark jerked his chin toward the glass of water. “Pour me one?”

Oliver filled the mug he’d broken and repaired, and passed it to Mark. “I’m really not. If you’re. . .comfortable being tied up now, that’s good. I’m happy for you. Truly.”

Mark looked at him with raised eyebrows over the rim of the mug. “You want to try that again? Maybe with a little more feeling this time?”

Oliver sighed and put the empty water glass in the sink. “Look, I believe you, okay? If you say you’re ready to try fooling around tied up, mazel tov, we’ll make it happen, but. . .how do you _know_ you’re ready? What if you’re wrong?”

“Well, thanks for that vote of confidence.”

“I’m serious. You’ve seen how stupidly easy it is to do the wrong thing, or to touch you the wrong way, and then. . .” 

“Then we slow down and go back to hanging out tied up without the sex for a while.” Mark frowned and put his mug down on the counter. “What’s this really about, Oliver?”

Oliver began washing his glass and tried not to think about Mona’s choked whimpers and Helen’s studied show of defiance whenever Driscoll was assigned to transport them. “I won’t hurt you like that again, Mark. I _can’t._ ”

“And I don’t want you to, believe me.” Mark took the glass out of Oliver’s hands, turned off the water, and clumsily nudged Oliver’s shoulder until they were facing each other. “But I trust you to take it slow and stop if I ask you to, and that’s. . .that means a lot. I’m not saying I’m _cured_ or anything, we’ll probably always have to be careful whenever I’m tied up, and definitely get rid of those leather cuffs because _fuck no,_ but I know you’d never hurt me.”

“What if I _do,_ though?” Oliver whispered.

“It’s a risk I’m willing to take. _Very_ willing,” Mark added, low and dark suddenly, and tugged him by the collar of his shirt into a kiss, with enough force and teeth to make Oliver’s breath hitch. “No rush, though,” he said, stepping back, and it was Oliver’s turn to sway into him for a moment before collecting himself. “Whenever you’re ready. Until then, come on.” He turned and called over his shoulder, “We’re watching Russian Doll now, and you’re going to like it.”

Oliver complained through the first episode, mostly to be contrary since Mark had been talking it up for a year. He’d lost his taste for time loop stories briefly after Yale, but enough time had passed that it didn’t really bother him anymore. He shut up and let himself get properly invested, and Mark curled up against him with Chloe’s eye-searing afghan draped over their laps.

He wasn’t sure when his hand had drifted from Mark’s shoulder to his neck, but somewhere in the third episode he noticed Mark leaning into him with half-closed eyes. Without thinking he scratched his nails up into Mark’s hair, and Mark gave a bitten-off groan and tipped his head back. He suddenly wanted to lean in and bite down on the impossibly soft skin at Mark’s neck, make him gasp and shake and raise bruises -

He caught himself and held his breath, trying not to think about Mark frozen and gasping while wearing furry purple cuffs, lips pressed together and jaw set with Oliver’s tie clumsily knotted around his wrists, standing in the living room with red marks on his hands and coils of rope sliding - _stop it,_ he told himself sternly, and made himself take in the Mark looking up at him on the couch, who for some reason trusted Oliver to touch him while he was tied up. 

“Okay?” Mark asked hazily.

Oliver let out his breath slowly. “Yeah,” he said hoarsely, and fisted his hand in Mark’s hair to mouth at his neck. Mark’s groan vibrated through his neck and buzzed at Oliver’s lips, and icy hot needles raced through him. 

Mark hadn’t been kidding when he’d said that being tied up forced him to be more still and focused. He wasn’t distracted in bed - far from it - but his focus tended to be on what Oliver wanted. Oliver didn’t hate it, because Mark was _very_ good and clearly enjoyed himself as much as Oliver did, but it was rare that he could take control for more than a few seconds. So having free rein to touch Mark and find all the spots that made him go boneless and gasping, and Mark couldn’t do anything about it other than curse and clutch at the afghan? Pure serotonin, as his students would have said.

Disappointingly quickly, Oliver found the limits of necking on the couch when one of them was tied up, and tugged at Mark’s shoulder. “Come on, our backs are going to hate us in the morning if we don’t move.” Mark made an unhappy noise and turned his head into Oliver’s neck. “I’m too, _mmh,_ too old for couch sex, Byron, get _up._ ” He pulled gently at the ropes, and finally got Mark off the couch.

As soon as they got to the bedroom, Oliver pulled Mark into a kiss with as much force as he could manage while also picking at the knots one-handed. Mark groaned into Oliver’s mouth and sank his hands into Oliver’s hair as soon as the ropes were off his wrists. “Hey,” Oliver said sharply and grabbed Mark’s hands. Mark hissed and his eyes flew open.

 _Shit._ Oliver loosened his grip and kissed Mark again, more softly this time. “Still good?” he whispered into Mark’s ear. Mark nodded quickly, and Oliver tugged at the hem of his shirt until Mark caught on and raised his arms so that Oliver could pull it off before picking up the rope again.

“Have I mentioned yet how _fucking hot_ it is that you can do that without looking?” Mark said, as Oliver kept eye contact while tying his hands back together.

“I could stand to hear it a little more.” Oliver pushed him lightly onto the bed until Mark was lying on his back. “Do you want me to tie your hands to the headboard? I think there’s more rope somewhere -”

“No,” Mark said quickly. “That’s, ah. I can just.” He raised his arms over his head and tucked them under one of the pillows. “Is that okay?”

“It’s _very_ okay.” Oliver took a second to enjoy the view before seeing how slowly he could touch Mark before both of them went insane. 

Mark wasn’t normally vocal in bed, but being tied up made him deliciously responsive, shivering and moaning from the back of his throat when Oliver hit a good spot. He felt light-headed and drunk on it. He got a little lost in the skin below Mark’s ribs, the ragged gasps next to his ear when Oliver sucked one of his nipples raw and red, the stretch and pull of muscle as Mark moved against him.

He resurfaced when he realized Mark was whispering “please” over and over. “Please what? What do you need?”

“Anything, I don’t care, just fucking touch me, _please -_ ”

“Wow, bossy,” Oliver said, laughing a little because this was a side of Mark he’d never seen before, and he kind of needed to see it a lot more now.

“Oliver I swear to _fucking Christ_ if you don’t stop fucking around -”

“Shh, shh, it’s okay, I’ve got you.” 

The sound that came out of Mark’s mouth when Oliver finally touched him was punched and frantic and loud enough that Oliver was grateful they didn’t share a bedroom wall with any neighbors. He had to keep reminding himself not to speed up and chase the helpless noises. A few times he got distracted dragging his teeth over the hickeys he’d left while they’d been necking on the couch, and had to catch himself and slow his hand, drawing frustrated whines out of Mark.

“God, you sound _fucking amazing._ ” Oliver barely recognized his own voice, already dark and rough, echoing in the tight space between their bodies into a growl. 

Mark’s hips stuttered out of rhythm and his shoulders braced tight against the bed. His arms flexed under the pillow, and Oliver couldn’t stop himself speeding up to wind Mark tighter and tighter, hearing himself groan along with him, until with a harsh, strangled sound, Mark jerked hard into him and spilled over his hand.

Oliver dropped his head against Mark’s shoulder to catch his breath. It took him a few seconds to realize that Mark was shaking. “Oh _shit,_ ” he hissed, wiping his hand on a tissue and untying Mark’s hands. As soon as he was free, Mark turned to bury his face in Oliver’s shirt. “You okay?”

Mark nodded against Oliver’s chest. “M’fine,” he said hoarsely.

Oliver stroked his hair with his clean hand and tried to stay calm, until Mark pulled away and scrubbed at his face. “Fucking _hell,_ ” he croaked, and cleared his throat. “Did I yell in your ear?”

“Not really, but you weren’t exactly quiet.” Oliver kissed his sweaty temple. “Are you all right?”

Mark was quiet for a moment. “Yeah,” he said, sounding slightly surprised. “Yeah, I am. Are you?”

Oliver took inventory. Now that he knew Mark wasn’t panicking, he was. . .remarkably calm, all things considered. Still aroused, but not so badly that he needed to do anything about it right now. Floating a little on a good sex high, even. “Thirsty as fuck, but yeah, I’m good.”

Mark shoved his shoulder lightly. “Well, my legs won’t fucking work, so _you’re_ getting us water.”

When Oliver came back with two glasses of water, Mark was pulling his right arm across his body and grimacing. “I forgot how _sore_ you get when you’re tied up. Remind me to stretch next time.”

“Next time, huh?”

“I’m down if you are.” Mark gulped half the glass and yawned, throwing an arm over Oliver. “Might even get crazy and try those purple handcuffs again.”

“Yeah, no, we’re not touching those for a good while.” Oliver might not have had a therapist for a sister, but even he knew better than to assume that one good orgasm was going to cure five years of being locked up, for either of them. They would always have to be careful around handcuffs, and rope, and basements, and all the other fun trauma souvenirs the AM had left them with.

Oliver would probably go back to being endlessly furious about that in the morning. Right now, he had an armful of blissed-out Mark, and it was hard to feel anything other than vaguely triumphant. He kissed the top of Mark’s head again and closed his eyes.


End file.
